Know Any Literary Animal Lovers?
Hi there PureJeevan readers! We wanted to let you know that Jim's new novel CHROO is available on Amazon. It's a crazy adventure involving a billionaire heiress, her Chihuahua BFF ("Chroo") and a host of human and animal characters. Find out more on Amazon! Here are some links:
***** DISCLAIMER: As with all of our posts here at Pure Jeevan, and particularly those tagged with a new term, "Nadi Balance," please refer to the disclaimer that runs at the bottom of all Pure Jeevan pages. Wendi and Jim are health researchers, educators, and extreme self-experimenters; not doctors. ******
If you've been following this Nadi Balance series, you're probably as fascinated as we are with the body and the myriad ways in which we can peer into our physical health through observation and experimentation. Yesterday, we learned about a blanace being necessary in the human body between fatty acids and sterol fats. (This is but one of the many balances we'll eventually talk about under the larger umbrella of Nadi Balance.) We shared how Wendi's body was in an an extremely unbalanced state, with her fatty acids far outweighing the amount of sterol fats.
When you're young and learning the letters of the alphabet, anything that starts with the same letter as your name becomes really special. Well, ever since I was a child and saw a Winnebago RV with the giant "W" on the side, I've been enchanted with the idea of one day owning one and traveling the world (at that age, I didn't realize I'd have to cross oceans to see everything).
If you've been following us for a while, you'll know that I was bringing that vision to life. It took years of convincing, but Jim was finally ready for such an adventure and together we began making plans. For more than two years we've been preparing to tour the country, while teaching about raw foods along the way. Our lives changed so dramatically when we found a way to heal our bodies (and more), a way that can also help others, and we just couldn't sit still. We feel called to spread the word about the raw food diet so others can at least hear that there's another way, that there's something different to try in their quest for health. I knew that crossing the country in an RV, planting the seeds about a raw food diet along the way, would be an efficient way of spreading the word.
As we promised yesterday, we're featuring a wonderful (and LONG!) video interview today with the incredible John Kohler of Santa Rosa, CA. You may be familiar with John from some of his popular web sites, most notably his "Living and Raw Foods" community site at www.RawFoods.com. Below are parts one, two, and three of Wendi's interview. They're roughly 10 minutes each. (That's a lot of time, I realize, but at least check out Part 1 if you're short on time, as it offers an amazing look at John's front yard.)
Wendi said she was at a loss for words when interviewing John at his home (and you'll soon see why!), because what he has done on his 1/10th of an acre lot is *phenomenal*. He told Wendi off the video that it's all a matter of trial and error--finding what grows easily and well, and working with those plants the most. If something takes a lot of effort, or is difficult to easily grown, he skips it and focuses on what can give the most yield for the least work. Almost everything grown on John's land is edible!
PART TWO:
PART THREE:
The video of John's garden and the pictures (see yesterday's post) are enough to inspire ANYONE to plant even a small garden for themselves! WOW!
John has a lot going on, including a monthly potluck. Wendi and KDcat happened to be in town on the night of the March potluck, so Wendi was invited to speak at the event. It was a nice, laid-back group of people, Wendi said, and they sat at a long table talking about the raw lifestyle, health issues / concerns, what children are fed in school, and so much more -- a really nice group of people, Wendi said, noting she'd love to visit them all again. To connect with John Kohler is pretty easy. He's on the internet at:
- RawFoods.com -- John's main community site
- GrowingYourGreens.com -- John's YouTube channel
- BeRaw.com -- Santa Rosa Meetup Group
- RawHealthExpo.com -- Annual Raw Foods Conference
Once again, we d love to thank our generous trip snack sponsor, Natural Zing, for helping us to make this possible on our budget!
Original Comments
Below, we have included the original comments from this blog post. Additional comments may be made via Facebook, below.
On March 19, 2010, wrote:
fantastic, thank you so much Wendi, very informative, what a guy and energy bomb he is, hope you are well again, you seem so
love to you
(Note: This is a closely-related piece to an earlier post ?entitled "Practice Is Your Key to Going Raw." I'll include a link to that article, below.* This one focuses more on recognizing your current level of progress.)
These days, I spend most of my free time cleaning up our fixer-upper home in Portland, so I haven't been going to the gym or regularly running as I had in the past. ?Hopefully, the house work is sufficient physical activity for me -- it sure does generate an appetite most days!
Our friend Kevin Gianni is turning 30 this weekend. When you do the math, that means he was born December 7, 1978, which was pretty much the apex of the disco era in America.It's no wonder the man struck the above pose in our back yard; dude's got the Village People in his blood! So, it would be really nice if you boogied down to his site, www.RenegadeHealth.com, and wished him a happy birthday. He's also on Twitter -- cast a shoutout to: @KevinGianni.
Read more: Hey, What Happened to the "Know Your Food" Series?
As raw foods enthusiasts for many years, Wendi and I have had the pleasure of patronizing raw food restaurants literally from coast to coast. Between us, we've been blessed to have sampled a more diverse spread of raw gourmet foods than have most people. (We hope that many others get to do this as well!)
From time to time in anyone's raw journey, it seems inevitable that thoughts crop up about opening a raw restaurant. For some, it's likely no more than a passing fantasy; for others, it may well become a firm business goal. We believe this is a fine and noble goal -- one that we'd like to see more people accomplish!
Read more: Some Thoughts on Opening a Raw Foods Restaurant -- Part I of II!
Jim here...Well, something awful happened today at Pure Jeevan, something utterly shocking to any raw foodie on the planet -- our Vitamix container broke! I know, I know... breathe with me: Deep breath in... deep breath out. There, that's better. It's going to be okay, I just know it!
Here's what happened:? The agitator assembly (the metal part at the bottom that connects to the blades inside the container) wore out. It blew some kind of bearing or something, lost its internal oil, and started making an infernal noise when we blended our morning smoothie. It was pretty clear we'd blended up our last elixir in that container.
We get asked from time to time about whether we like to use protein powders and, if so, which brands we like. As you'll no doubt notice after getting into raw foods for a while, raw foodies (just like quite a lot of health-conscious people) often get into various powdered food additives. Some purists are against their use, of course. But, we're not so dead set against them. We do, however, believe that, if you're going to put something into your body as part of a health program, you should be conscious about it.
A few months ago, Wendi decided that she wanted to add some protein into her diet in the form of a protein powder. She did quite a bit of research at the time into the various brands available, charting out which ones were raw, which ones had various ingredients, and so forth. It was a fairly in-depth study, done for personal reasons unrelated to Pure Jeevan's blog articles. So, we never mentioned it before.
Read more: Protein Powder Smoothies Part 1 of 3: Selecting the Powder
Jim here... Today marks the half-way point of the month of May. Let me tell you, time really does fly when you're as busy as we are here at Pure Jeevan. We're still working hard on selling our home, arranging for the acquisition of an RV for our national tour, reducing our worldly possessions to a minimum, packing up the ones we're going to? keep, writing for Pure Jeevan, keeping in touch with online Pure Jeevan friends and family, and even a new project or two that will, I promise, totally blow you away! In addition, it's beautiful outside once again, and we've been trying to get out more often for exercise, fun, and soaking in some Vitamin D!
As you can imagine, we need high energy to do all of these things, so you may be wondering:? On that low fat raw vegan regimen, how's it going ?
I'm makin' nothing today, or for the next eight days! Think of all the time I'm saving myself by consuming only mono meals for nine days. What will I end up doing with that extra time? So far, today, I've spent a long time outside soaking up the sun's beautiful rays that I've missed far too much this Winter. I have no idea what the rest of this mono journey is going to be like, but I'm up for the adventure!
I've started a little journal on my desktop to track my nine days of mono meals, so I'll share what I've written from time-to-time. Here's what I have, so far...